Garden Architecture - making trellis for vegetables

Making growing spaces for your plants not only helps them produce more, it is also aesthetically pleasing and gives the garden texture and a focal point.  Now I did not design my Community Patch to be a show place.  I am more interested in production, but that does not mean I cannot appreciate that the eye is now drawn to the center of my garden where the tall pole bean pyramid has been located.

Here are some details of the architecture we have now installed in out Community Patch.  We made everything "disposable."  We have to remove everything from the garden at the end of the season, so there is no need to make anything too special.

Raised Bed

For all the details of the raised bed, check out the detailed blog posts I did.  One here on the Community Patch and the other detailing some of the thyme plants on my herbal blog.


Trellis

There are several methods of creating trellis architecture in the garden.  Some are very formal, others not so much.  We have used several different methods.

Cages

We used simple wire cages, which we purchased at the hardware store, to enclose the tomatoes and peppers and give the support when the fruit will later cause the to topple.

Formed wood Trellis

This is a sturdy form entirely of pine that I nailed together to create a diagonal walk up for the cucumber climbers.  We have two cucumbers so I placed the trellis in between each plant has its own side to climb.

String Frame

peas before the frame

Sometimes all a plant needs it s a place to grow upward.  Peas love a bit of string, so i placed two natural wood sticks int eh ground and strung them back and forth with cotton string.  I will add more rows of string as the plants get longer.

 I did not want to string the entire frame up front because sun will degrade the string over time, so adding new for the top branches every week or so will give better support and longer life to the frame.

Pyramid Trellis

This trellis is for the pole beans.  They need rigid support and something tall to grow on.  They are also planted next to the bush beans so we are going to let them grow above the bush beans planted just the right and left of the center support.

We again used cotton string, this time a twisted triple or quadruple length of string which we held tight to the ground with plastic tent stakes.  In the center is the same style pine frame work we used to make the cucumber trellis.

The pine will weather to gray over the summer, which will be a nice touch!

The final look has three strings on each side for the three dominant pole beans that have sprouted from the seed we planted.

Community Patch - Growing Thyme in a Raised Bed

I love lemon herbs.  I love all lemon herbs, but I love lemon thyme the most.  I also like common thyme and creeping thyme and well, just about any thyme you can imagine.  I grow 17 different (grew, this past winter whittled them down to 12) varieties of thyme.  About half the varieties have a lemon scent or flavor.  I could not resist the opportunity to create a special bed for the thyme plants as a way of demonstrating how to craft a raised bed.

This thyme bed is located on the far left side of my garden patch.  It receives full sun, all day!
Here is a diagram of the bed (I got this idea for describing my beds from Lemon Verbena Lady.  She used this method to explain her garden rearrangement this year.)

1           9            6

2          4           7

3          5            8

1 French Thyme
2 German Thyme
3 Silver Thyme
4 Golden lemon thyme
5 Doone Valley Lemon thyme
6 English Thyme
7 Lemon thyme
8 Golden Thyme
9 Orange Thyme


To create the raised bed, I did not clear out the existing soil, level the ground, build a frame and fill it which is the traditional method for making raised beds.  Instead I did the less-effort method.  With this method, you just scoop the soil into a low hill crafting edges or toughs around the planting area.  I even went so far as to plant the bed with thyme before I even constructed the raised bed.

To construct the raised bed I decided to use something easy to acquire and disposable.  I choose willow branches.  I collected them in the Spring, March I think.  When the snow had melted and the winter drop from the willow trees was littering the ground.  I collected a huge bundles of sticks trying for those that had varying thicknesses that were about 3 to 4 feet in length.

Using my hand trimmers I cut stakes from the larger branches.  Placing them along the edges of the bed about 4 to 5 inches apart.  I did not measure this.  I used the distance between my extended pinky and thumb if you were flashing a "Hang 10" symbol.  I wanted a spacing close enough to keep the sticks from flopping, but far enough so that I could actually weave the stems between the stakes without too much breakage.

To make the work easier, I laid several bundles of willow branches along each side so I could reach them as I went around the bed working the weave.

All you do is an alternate inside outside between the stakes.

I did opposite sides first.  I have found it is easier to work the side weave into existing ends rather than working the weave from a corner position.  With two ends (sides) completed, I have a stable place to work the side branches into at both ends which also allows me to use broken branches or those that are too short. 

Here you can see the completed weaving.  The sticks stick out the ends and will need to be trimmed as  with the upright stakes.  better to make the stakes to long and trim them off, that to have your branches pop over the top becasue the stake is too short.  I did not trim the stakes until I placed the extra soil and top dressing in the raised bed.  Then I trimmed the stkes becasue I was no longer pushing up agasint the weave.

Here is another angle on the completed weave.  Notice there are now extra stakes in each of the corners.  I placed one on the outside of each corner and on the inside.  This created a bit more stability in the corners and kept any stray branches from wanting to pop out of the weave.  If I have problems with the branches staying put (which i do not expect) I can  tie these double up stakes with wire or raffia.

Here is a slightly better view of the extra corner stakes.

notice the weeds among the thyme

Once the stakes were all in place I put top soil into the bed to bring the soil level even with the outline of the woven fence.  I then gave a top and side dressing of mushroom compost over the entire bed.  This filled the space the woven fence created making the bed uniform and attractive. Axtra compost in a raised bed is important as you are generally adding soil .  A nice cool compost like mushroom compsot is great for this.

Weeding Thyme is a pain in the butt.  Grass, small leafy plants and other things get between the branches and it is like pulling out one blade of grass at a time when you have to weed, so a top dressing of dark rich compost also cuts down on the weeds and allows the bed to hold more moisture.  Now I will not have to water this corner of the garden as often.  (Which is good because the hose does not reach that far!)

Here is the finished bed:

After I crafted the raised bed, added the compost and soil and watered the bed well, I then gave all the thyme plants a hair cut.  I harvested 1/2 of their height (I could have gone 3/4 but there would not have been much to photograph then......  They may look small now, but this trimming and the nourishing bed and they will become larger bushier plants in no time.

trimmed thyme